


Snake in Sheep’s Cloathing

by LostMyWit



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1920s, Alternate Universe - 1930s, Alternate Universe - Farm/Ranch, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Prohibition Era, Alternate Universe - Western, Arizona - Freeform, Bootlegging, Crimes & Criminals, Drifter Jon Snow, Dust Bowl, F/M, Great Depression, Heavy Drinking, Mexican Revolution Background, Military Backstory, Murder, Organized Crime, Prohibition, Radio, Technically Mezcal, Tequila
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-04
Updated: 2018-07-04
Packaged: 2019-06-05 10:08:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 731
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15168383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LostMyWit/pseuds/LostMyWit
Summary: ‘He took a drag from his cigarette and smiled at her. “I’ve killed for less beautiful things than you.”’In which Arianne is the last of her family, left with a failing farm and bootlegging operation as the Great Depression and the Lannisters close in. A dusty drifter with a strange dog offers his help.Link to the visual aid on my tumblr-https://lostmywit.tumblr.com/post/176825189920/visual-aid-to-my-ao3-story-a-snake-in-sheeps





	Snake in Sheep’s Cloathing

She sat on the stoop of the porch, listening the radio play static, intermittent with music and Spanish words, thinking that it didn’t feel right that a home as old as her’s could be taken from her by something as modern as a bank. It just seemed wrong.

The house wasn’t much, two bedrooms and main room that functioned as a kitchen, with whitewashed ceilings to reflect the light and stone walls the color of the endless desert all around her. It wasn’t much, but it was all she had ever known. All she had left.

She wasn’t sure when her house, because it was _her_ house now, had been built, but it was a few hundred years old. Her ancestors had come from Spain by way of Mexico, back when the world was new, and built the house on taken land.

She toyed with that notion in her head. Taken land, taken again. Perhaps it was just fate, the way it was.

She took a swig from the bottle of agave spirits resting next to her. Fate had nothing to do with it, she decided. Just greed.

She watched the horizon, as the sun and sky and earth all blended in to one, the reds and pinks and oranges bleeding and melting together as a summer day died. She watched as the shadows stretched out and the dark came, and the cold with it. She wrapped the porch blanket around her as she took another drink of spirits. The cold was biting, but the liquor warmed her to her bones.

The rest of the world, at least, seemed to be in the same hole. Just about all the other farms and ranches were in dept and losing workers. There hadn’t been a hand since Aero, and he’d been as much family as help. The only family she’d had left, in fact, now that her father and uncle were dead, and her brothers and cousins were gone. She was all that was left.

She didn’t know what time it was when she finished the bottle and went inside to finally sleep, the smokey taste of the agave spirits still on her tongue.

  
She woke at dawn, despite the absence of the cockcrow. Their last rooster had been eaten by coyotes in the night last week, and she hadn’t yet gone to get a new one.

The house was mostly empty. There was her bed, the old stove, and the ancient armchair that her father had as good as lived in for his final years, with a few rugs and oil lamps. The only item of real luxury left was the radio, a remnant from a time when their product had been in high demand, and her family had had money to spare. All the rest had been thrown out or sold.

She went about her routine. Collect eggs and feed the chickens, feed the goats, and inspect the peppers and herbs. It didn’t take long enough.

After a meager breakfast, she sat on the porch. She wondered if today would be the day she finally went into town. She’d used to go every few days, but it had been over two weeks since her last visit. It was almost ten miles as the crow flies, longer if the road was followed. The car they normally used had broken down, and she wasn’t even sure if there was a mechanic left in town that could repair it.

It was still early in the morning, but already the heat was setting in. Soon, it would be so hot that everything would seem to melt, even the stones of the house. She looked out at the desert, the dust and the sparse vegetation, thinking of how she’d used to hate it. She’d hated it with all her being, how dirty the dust made her cloths, how the sun made her dizzy, how she was always parched. 

She had changed now. She was part of the desert, just as the dust in her lungs and the thirst in her mouth were part of her. Once upon a time she would have fought it, but not anymore. 

She was about to fetch a bottle and a revolver and just make the damn trek, before it became too hot, when she saw something unusual out of the corner of her eyes.

A person, coming up the road.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> This is more of a preview than a complete first chapter, and later installments will hopefully be longer. This idea has been dancing around my head for a while, and I hope I can do good work with it. 
> 
> Prompts, Feedback and criticism of all kinds welcome. Thanks for reading.
> 
> For moodborads, aesthetics, and visual aids to my stories, I’m on Tumblr at AriJon Extras by LostMyWit.


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